Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 1.djvu/313

Rh 6.

It boots not that, together bred,

Our childish days were days of joy:

My spring of life has quickly fled;

Thou, too, hast ceas'd to be a boy.

7.

And when we bid adieu to youth,

Slaves to the specious World's controul,

We sigh a long farewell to truth;

That World corrupts the noblest soul.

8.

Ah, joyous season! when the mind

Dares all things boldly but to lie;

When Thought ere spoke is unconfin'd,

And sparkles in the placid eye.

9.

Not so in Man's maturer years,

When Man himself is but a tool;

When Interest sways our hopes and fears,

And all must love and hate by rule.

10.

With fools in kindred vice the same,

We learn at length our faults to blend;

And those, and those alone, may claim

The prostituted name of friend.